Critics of small hydro power do tend to make an exception for remote, isolated communities. But they also emphasise that it should be used as a last resort. Cipra, an Alps-wide organisation promoting sustainable development in the area, for example recommends using small hydro plants "for limited and isolated local needs only". Using them for energy production beyond these remote areas would require such a large number of plants "that the cumulative environmental impact would be ecologically unbearable".
